Monday, December 20, 2010

Here we have Randy attempting to write a comic from the annals of his own life. Like all great writers, he is able to take the trials and tribulations [EDIT: I mean slings and arrows LOLOLOL] of day-to-day living and make them into something transcendent--a brilliant piece of art, a statement of philosophy, a nearly word-for-word rehash of an old punchline. These are the things that make Randy so great and that relegate us to writing the posts and comments of a hate blog.

You see, Randall has recently had a brush with illness, and he no doubt heard someone ask a very similar question--not of him, of course, because he wasn't actually sick LOL!!!!--and found it offensive. Why should he look for answers beyond science when science has done vaguely helpful things for medicine? Of course, at the time all he could think of was "shut up your god is stupid only Megan is worthy of my worship" but as time wore and as he ran out of other ideas for a comic, Randy knew that the game was on. It was time to prove to the world, as he does thrice weekly, that he was a brilliant writer, worthy to sit with greats such as R.L. Stine, Gertrude Warner, and Ann M. Martin.

"What do brilliant writers do?" he asked himself, as he seated himself at his shrine of empty soda cans and Cheetos wrappers. And he knew he had the answer: they find a way to awkwardly force an incredibly well-known Shakespeare quotation into their hamfisted monologues. Hamlet's famous "to be or not to be" speech would work sufficiently well. But it can't be taken directly. First, he needs to make it a mixed metaphor--"groping for comfort before the slings and arrows of fortune" sounds much worse than seeking protection from them, or some verb that actually has something to do with slings and arrows! Definitely when you're being shot at you "grope for comfort." He also had to get rid of the word "outrageous," but that's probably because he doesn't actually know that it's there.

And then, just when you thought his Shakespeare reference was forgotten, he brings it back with what must be the most brilliant inversion since that one time I said to someone "you're really dumb" and he replied "no, you." Science, you see, has given us slings and arrows of our own! Damn powerful ones!

DO YOU SEE WHAT HE JUST DID THERE? IS YOUR MIND TOTALLY FUCKING BLOWN? (what he did there is use the phrase "slings and arrows" again, but instead of them being weapons used by outrageous fortune against us, they are weapons used by us against fortune, I guess?)

But he's not done! He saves the very best for last. He concludes his "science rocks and people who do anything besides science are actively trying to kill me" monologue--truly the greatest monologue since that scene at the start of Romeo and Juliet where Gregory and Sampson are talking about cutting off the heads of the maids, or their maidenheads, take it in what sense thou wilt--by drawing a parallel to one of the oldest and most well-known of XKCDs, called simply Science. The only text of that one, apart from the graph from the COBE mission, is "Science. It works, bitches." It was made into a t-shirt! You may have seen some nerds wearing it around.

Except now instead of "science" working, bitches, it is the weapons he takes from science that work, bitches. I'm sure there is some deep parallel here, but my mind is too feeble in comparison to the greatness that is Randy to grasp them all. I can do naught but grok in wonder.

Posted by
Rob

181 comments:

I see Randy still subscribes to the conflict thesis; religion (by which he means human spirituality) and science (by which he means rational thought) are mutually exclusive concepts that can never coexist. Never! As the Highlander said, there can be only one. Spoiler alert: it's the one Randy likes.

I think I figured it out. Carl started redux and it has been him the whole time. This whole thing is like new coke. Now he is reintroducing old coke and making us defect from new coke, thus making us realize how much we have liked old coke this whole time. GENIUS!

I don't disagree with Lord Randall's point; I'm glad there's been some advance in the medical field that helps people live longer, better lives, and it frustrates me when I hear of people doing things like relying on faith to heal someone who is sick when the sickness is otherwise treatable (or there is a vaccination out, or whatever).

As a comic? Terrible choice. There's nothing funny about it. Perhaps I agree with the views, but it's not going to make me laugh when I see someone posting in agreement. "Because they work, bitches" is not a punchline; it's someone trying to act as a champion of science and intellect and get the pathetic fans rallied behind him, in one big GOOMHR circle-jerk.

Looking at the Shakespeare quote, I hesitate to use the word "pretentious" but I think it fits well enough. Who the fuck is he trying to impress? It's like he's writing an essay for his high school English teacher, hoping to squeeze some sort of special attention out because he knows a popular quote from a famous playwright. DEEP STUFF RANDY

Redux: Look at that pathetic manchild. What a fantastic drama queen...

I don't know what exactly drove me away from insulting the redux haxx0r any further. Maybe it was the stupidly hacked together photoshop; maybe it was his increasingly stupidity and immaturity; maybe it was the fact that he still thinks having someone's IP is a valuable weapon(someone who should know having the IP of a personal computer is useless, since IPs are given dynamically by the ISP). Either way, it's boring and pathetic now. I'm gonna use the time I'd waste reading that man-child make a fool of himself for something more useful, like, maybe, bashing my head against a wall.

So, XKCD.

This comic was awful. It was even made worse for the fact that Randall's reasoning is not unlike, say, Carl Sagan's. For someone who's read The Demon-Haunted World at least three times, it's pretty clear the problem with Randall is not his ideals. It's his discourse.

Randall is awkward and can't realize he's not being respectful at all, despite his little disclaimer of "I begrudge nobody". His discourse is not unlike those of religious people who cannot accept that you can be perfectly happy without worshiping their god once a week.

Besides, the comic as a whole is awful. The panel layout is unneededly shoddy, the art is only barely good for one panel(then the background vanishes and the heads start to float), He filled one panel with text, text, boring text, and then literally ripped off his own punchline.

He truly is a dumbass, and I guess he deserves the fans he's got. Dumbasses worshiping a dumbass.

Good thing Wicca has made promising advances over the past century in treating that with amethyst pendants! Disclaimer: I begrudge no one their source of solace, but Wicca has a history of working for privileged angsty white kids, you sluts-for-science.

"the irony of Randall blindly worshiping the abstract concept of SCIENCE while simultaneously putting down those who blindly worship a god."

Science as a concept cannot be worshipped. It's only religious nuts (note: I'm not saying all people who are religious are nuts) who have no understanding of what science actually is who believe it can be "worshipped" or "believed in".

Science is trying to find truth through observation. If those observations proof our currently held beliefs to be false, we will simply change those beliefs. There is no penalty for being wrong in science. Scientists believe that the universe is rational and can be explained by rational rules. But if observation proves that to be wrong, science will simply change.

Faith and science are two completely non-overlapping principles, which is why it's perfectly possible to be a scientist and still believe in a God, despite what some overzealous atheists might think.

So a bit of quick googling reveals that the redux hacker is also a /b/tard (also that redux has not yet been mentioned on the xkcd forums outside of a brief observation back in october, when Carl moved on). So to summarize, we're dealing with a 4chan mouthbreather who isn't actually doing anything in concert with the rest of the xkcd forum. Ladies and gents, we found the dumbest xkcd fan.

REALLY? HE'S A /B/TARD? I WOULD NEVER HAVE GUESSED BASED ON HIS ACTIONS AND WORDS.

But that's interesting... you mean Lord Randall isn't rallying his troops of hackers over at the xkcshithole forums? So this guy is acting independently, and probably alone, from his mother's basement.

yes. Well, Rob suggested that it was really redux himself (because that's Randall Munroe, not Ryan North, photoshopped into the diaper pic), so to verify I went searching to see if the xkcd forums were involved (an absence would support the argument that it's really redux himself). And then I found some 4chan threads asking for aid in trolling/hacking on redux to defend "my favorite webcomic".

If Science and Religion were mutually exclusive as Randell believes then we still might not know what we know about genetics, since the father of modern genetics was an abbot.

While Science has helped get rid of a lot of diseases, there are still many that currently have no cures. While medicine can help, it only gives someone with lets say AIDS on average an extra 4-12 years with the mainstream treatment (if they respond). So it's very much an asshole move to call people who seek solace elsewhere blind idiots that don't notice all the science working around them.

Note how they are not only very clearly the same person, they're very clearly the same fucking image.

Now, with the knowledge that the current Redux is not, in fact the original poster, and that the imposter is a member of /b/, and that he probably just got trolled by fellow /b/tards in his request for help, the simplest explanation would seem to be that Redux went to /b/ for help, but also for a pic of Ryan North to photoshop into his diaper pic (or, even better, a pic of ryan north photoshopped already, because this kid is probably too incompetent to do it himself). So /b/ laughed him off, but not before one noble /b/tard gave him what he wanted, using a pic of Randall Munroe instead.

"Science as a concept cannot be worshipped. It's only religious nuts (note: I'm not saying all people who are religious are nuts) who have no understanding of what science actually is who believe it can be "worshipped" or "believed in"."

you can worship anything you want, dude. Randy worships Science.

"Science is trying to find truth through observation. If those observations proof our currently held beliefs to be false, we will simply change those beliefs. There is no penalty for being wrong in science. Scientists believe that the universe is rational and can be explained by rational rules. But if observation proves that to be wrong, science will simply change."

you are describing the scientific process, not the Field Of Science. there's a difference. one of them has capital letters and is spoken in dramatic tones, preferably with ominous music in the background, and would give Randy a hard-on if the "family member" who was "sick" wasn't just his "penis" being "completely unable to maintain an erection"

Unless we are the redux troll, in which case we assume someone is Ryan North if they are wearing a t-shirt with a velociraptor on it because Ryan North writes comics about dinosaurs and a velociraptor is a dinosaur.

It seems pretty clear at this point that the redux guy is just mucking around. Unless he's the actual owner of the blog continuing a prank for longer than is reasonable, it's some guy who doesn't give a damn one way or the other about XKCD but happened to get access to the account somehow and is now sporting a 24 hour erection thanks to all the unprecedented attention he's getting.

I'd like to call your attention, first of all, to the redux post about Randy's announcement that he was taking a break from comics, and later, the one about Jeph Jacques' guest post. Pay attention to the comment threads. In both of these he briefly maintains the facade that he doesn't understand the comic--in the case of the QC guest post, he uses the following dubious and obvious joke logic: "I don’t see what evidence there is to lead one to think that Randall didn’t make the comic. It has stick figures.

Compare this, if you will, to his recent claim that "that isn't Randall Munroe because he's wearing a shirt with a dinosaur on it, and Randall Munroe doesn't make a comic about dinosaurs."

Note well the similarity between these arguments here. Note that neither of them is something that a real human would ever actually say--especially not an actual Randall Munroe fanboy.

Add to this the sheer unlikeliness that the diaper photoshop with Randy's face was unintentional, and the nonsequitur nature of said diaper photoshop.

Finally, redux made a similar sad attempt at trolling #xkcd-sucks a while back. While this isn't the same in execution, the idea and nature is the same: he has adopted an oblivious persona and is saying intentionally stupid shit to make people make fun of him more.

I expect the Randall Munroe picture was meant to be a "lol i troll u" flag, but people persisted in taking him seriously, so he is no doubt seeing how far he can take it before everyone catches on.

I'm pretty sure Rob's right; Redux appeared when the future of this site was uncertain, and he probably hoped to claim the old xkcdsucks fanbase, then degrade them as a true stroke of genius. Fortunately, Rob swooped in and saved us all, while redux continued in hopes of attaining a large following, but he most likely grew bored and recognized that he was getting nowhere--then the Gawker hack appeared--this was too good to pass up, and he used it to his full advantage. It also looks like all his previous reviews are still available--someone as conceited as redux wouldn't ever think of destroying any of his hard work--no? But, I would think that a "hacker" that desired to destroy xkcd-hate would remove any traces of criticism.

Wait... the bobcat was in a comic about Ebay, but an individual seller on Ebay wouldn't have a coupon code system, would it?

Stop referencing yourself when you can't come up with a joke!

Also, when the only joke in your comic is in the alt-text, you shouldn't post the comic. Also also, is that the best blackmail subject he could come up with? "Took something from a dying woman's house"? I've done worse things that that which I will freely admit to.

Isn't this just an instance of robots behaving like humans? At first I thought this was another obscure reference, but it doesn't seem to be; just another reference to an old comic. Any ideas what the next comic will be a reference too? Perhaps the red-spiders? Or centrifuges? Sudo make me a comic?

"Why should he look for answers beyond science when science has done vaguely helpful things for medicine?"

That's honestly the stupidest thing I've heard all day. This comic lacks humour, but your post here made me face-palm.What else could've done anything for the field of medicine? Please, enlighten me, because I honestly think every single medical substance you've taken in the last year, if not your life, which actually worked, was the product of the scientific method.I guess science has only done vaguely helpful things for space travel as well, right?

Honestly, Randall might lack a humour gland, but at least he apparently still has the rest of his brain...

This post together last post's failed attempt at humour ("Oh, look Randy has a weird crush on this Megan-girl, let's assume every comic he makes is made to impress her, also, let's assume he knows nothing about how reality works (*cough*), roflolol I'm so much funnier than him") have made it pretty clear that this blog is actually worse than what it's supposed to criticise.

At least Carl only criticised instead of making a fool out of himself...

What I really hate about this comic in particular (and many XKCD strips in general these days) is that even when I agree with the sentiment, it's expressed so horribly that it's just an embarrassment. I agree with Randy that science is super awesome and all, I don't give a shit if he disrespects religion, but what I do give a shit about is him making the whole "science is great!" attitude look so DUMB.

This comic is the nerd equivalent of household tchotchke glurge, like a cheap plaque from a craft fair painted with something like "Hand over the chocolate and no one gets hurt!" Like a forwarded email with a doggerel about the true meaning of friendship and animated clip art puppies.

It's the equivalent of everything the average XKCD fan surely loathes about the culture of "normal" people and thinks themselves above, but with the subject matter changed to science. And the nerds who eat this shit up are no better than religious people who think Christian rock is actually good.

Well, if Mr. Haxx0r is redux himself, he's a dumbass. A complete braindead dimwit. He had a good site going, one that was quicker and clearly had more effort put in each reviews than this. Until the first "hacking", I read redux for the reviews and this site for the comment threads. So if he turned into a drama whore and decided to pull this stunt for attention, fuck it. The blog is already out of my RSS list. Don't care anymore.

So, comic 837: it's... goody. His blackmail material is lame, his self-references are pitiable... but it's a good idea. You could say that the coupon acceptance is made by an automatic system and would never reach the seller, but seriously, if you do that, you lose. That's like hating Dinosaur Comics because a Tyrannosaurus rex wouldn't be alive today to step on a modern house, that is so unrealistic!

Re: reduxSadly, that makes a lot of sense (especially his most recent posts, its painfully clear now he's merely trolling). I went to redux for entertainment, but trolling a posing xkcd hater isn't very entertaining at all. Additionally, since as a general rule I try not to feed people's egos whenever possible, I will be copying Mole and unsubscribibg to redux in my rss. I'm going to stop visiting the site now altogether; he's getting far more attention with these antics and he's not likely to stop.

I don't know, putting blackmail into a coupon code is mildly amusing even if it isn't groundbreaking humour. The choice of misdeed used in the blackmail is also novel in my own experience, although it might be used more frequently than I'm aware of. At least it's more creative than saying something about seeing somebody sleep with somebody they shouldn't have, in any case.

what am i surrounded by idiots? Edward 'Limerick' Lear used to hang around here ages back, posting limericks for every xkcd, starting with 740. Then there was a very long hiatus then they came back for comic 830, before announcing on the 831/2 thread that they were setting up limerixkcd. Though we got a bonus one for 834 because of how awesome we are.

tl;dr if you only just heard about limerixkcd you might be a bit stupid?

EDIT: actually i have just checked and there is apparently just the limerick for 740 and then no-others until the recent spate? so, um, what is the deal with that, i was sure there were loadsthis does not change the tl;dr bit though

CAPTCHA: hupacull. hupas are a proven vector of TB and there is no alternative if we want to safeguard britain's cow population

838 made me chuckle, which is more than I can say of any xkcd since Weiner's guest strip. It's not an especially hilarious joke but it has all the necessary content for a joke, no post-punchline dialogue and it's reasonably unexpected.

The fact that sudo does show that (unnecessarily) creepy response if you use it when you're not in the sudoers file is as good a source of amusement as anything. I mean, logically most any activity gets 'reported' (logged) the same way an unsuccessful sudo use is and it feels vaguely Orwellian to be told you've been reported for using it without knowing that you weren't in the sudoers file.

So we've been bombarded by thousands upon thousands of years of religious bullshit, various churches have often had illegitimate control over politics, law and people's personal lives, any politician is pretty much unelectable if they claim to be atheist, but the people who worship science without understanding, and sometimes troll internet forums, are JUST AS BAD???

Fuck, get some perspective. This is like saying Martin Luther King was as bad as the KKK, or the suffragettes were as bad as the assholes keeping the vote from women.

Oh you poor fucking christians, how the oppression of THE OCCASIONAL AD ON A BUS must weigh down on you!

omg anon447 is right, guys, we need to stop persecuting the Atheists they have it far too hard in Western Society, so just lay off them and let them do their thing and that'll solve everything just like 1930s Germany, right guyz??

"any politician is pretty much unelectable if they claim to be atheist"

Prime Minister Julia Gillard, anyone? Granted, she didn't win by a huge margin but I don't think the issue of religion was used against her anywhere near as much as it was used against the (devoutly Catholic) Opposition leader Tony Abbott.

I don't know if any of you guys listen to MC Frontalot, but I got some CDs for Christmas and I was flipping through the lyrics booklet for one of the albums to find Randy has done some mini-"comics" to go with the lyrics. :I

For the record, whoever originally said that was referring directly to US politics. You know, that 300-million strong highly religious country over there in North America? It obviously won't apply to highly atheist countries like, say, the Czech Republic. And, of course, given that Randall has shown an American perspective, being an American, in his comics, you probably shouldn't be getting so worked up about the discussions of said comics also having an American perspective.

4:47 , Satheists are literally the worst people in the world. Go to any terrible atheist blog (they're all the same anyway), read the cookie cutter content and despair at humanity. The movement is everything wrong with nerds AND religion itself with none of the benefits of either.

Wow, so an atheist was elected somewhere? That completely invalidates my point about atheists being treated like shit politically! Never mind the U.S. (from which I'm not), all of South America (from which I am), many major countries in Europe, the entire Middle East, freaking India and Pakistan (1.3 billion strong), etc etc. Australia has a non-religious PM, that makes everything all right for atheists in politics! You know, the existence of Julia Gillard should also make women shut up about political equality already.

@Ravenzomg and "1930s Germany", obvious troll is obvious.

@R. it is at the very least hilarious to criticize ATHEISTS for being all the same.

i am talking about the hardcore fundamentalist types, not atheists in general.they all use the exact same arguments and quotes. the same smug, arrogant tone. they read like they're all written by the same person.

To be totally fair, Gillard's atheism wasn't exactly a political advantage and the fact that I even know about it as an Aussie is because she cops flack for it - apparently it's traditional for a newly accepted PM to recite some speech which mentions God or something like that and she's the first in history not to do it. That is literally the only thing my grandmother (amongst many others) wants to know about her in terms of why she 'shouldn't be leading our country'.

It is equally 'hilarious' to criticize people with faith for being all the same. My religious friends cringe at the 'people getting it all wrong' in the same way that I cringe at certain atheist fundie types.

Reference to socialist regimes and the like is fair game in a discussion like this because it highlights the point that it's not "religious bullshit" that is responsible for this sort of thinking. Take religion out of the equation and we don't all suddenly become enlightened, rational beings, unfortunately. That may be sort of muddling up cause and effect a bit.

@Anon651/447: I'm very proud of you for figuring out that comparing Atheists to Nazis was hyperbole! Have a cookie, and go sit in the corner and you can feel special for identifying that one -- I know it was difficult, and you're probably feeling a lot smarter than everyone who didn't point it out [surely that was because they didn't get it and thought that the comment was serious, nono, this is the internet -- everyone is serious]]. Congratulations on calling it. Truly, you have redeemed Atheists with your startling ability to reason -- we give up. Religion surrenders. We can't win against that type of intellect. The world is yours, you can have your eternal emptiness.

Nobody can really count as a "troll" on this site anyways because, due to Rob's Carlic sloth and refusal to forsake flesh and humanity and turkey, these threads rarely if ever have any focus. If someone really wanted to troll this site, they'd create intelligent and regular updates, and moderate a discussion on XKCD.

"If someone really wanted to troll this site, they'd create intelligent and regular updates, and moderate a discussion on XKCD."And then throw a bitch fit, pretend to get "hacked" and delete all the site's content.

It might be my imagination but it seems like "Rob" and "Emily" show up almost as much as "Megan". Really, even if none of these are real people and it's not in any way a sign of some creepy obsession, it's at least the sign of some sort of OCD-like commitment to unorginality.

@R. A lot of atheists are shallow. A lot of advocates for black people and homosexuals are also shallow. But the debate is not about who is the biggest asshole.

@MykalT, I don't think anyone claimed "atheism will bring peace on Earth". Respect for homosexuals and black people will probably not end wars either. However it would be nice if they had the same chance of running a country as whites and heteros?

@Ravenzomg, nice content-free post. The African-American civil rights movement sure could have used an idiot comparing them to Nazis and then acting smug about being ignored.

@ScottMcTony, it boggles the mind that anyone would consider Rob not retarded.

I was mostly addressing this: "So we've been bombarded by thousands upon thousands of years of religious bullshit, various churches have often had illegitimate control over politics, law and people's personal lives, any politician is pretty much unelectable if they claim to be atheist."

If for these thousands upon thousands of years there'd been no religion, then we would have been bombarded by some other form of 'bullshit', it would be some other group besides churches with 'illegitimate control', and anybody outside said group would have just as much trouble gaining control. Religious types may point to Lenin or whoever and say, "see? This is what happens when there is no religion in politics!!!" This is not fantastic logic, of course, but it's the same argument when we point to governments that do mix religion in there. Of course, people who defy the views of those who already have power will have a harder time getting their foot in the door, but that's because people are closed-minded idiots, not because religion makes them so.

The point is, simply, that it isn't religion that makes people throw their heads in the sand and treat other people like crap. Religion can be used as an excuse to do so, and people without religion will find their own excuses.

Also, speaking of atheist regimes which exercise a ridiculous amount of control, I am in China right now, and the Great Firewall allows me to view xkcd freely, but to come here I need to sneak past with a proxy.

In other words, China is pro-xkcd. And their government has no religious influence whatsoever! WHERE IS MY UNGOD NOW?!

MykalT: Proving once again that pessimism and naiveté aren't opposites after all.

There'd be less bullshit, and probably a lot less. That's not everything, but that's not nothing. Yes, some of the bullshit that would be removed would just be replaced, other bullshit would keep existing, but you seriously under-estimate the effect religion can have on peoples minds if you think it's always, or even usually, just an excuse and not a cause.

Ravenzomg and R. i guess: I don't think he was saying atheists now have it as bad as blacks in the 50s. But right now, in the world, atheists are probably only slightly behind homosexuals for total discrimination (it varies by area, obviously), ahead of every other group, and historically ahead of everyone.(not trying to make it into a contest, it's just a convenient way of phrasing it). And calling people trying to work against that assholes and fucktards is just.. a bit awful.Incidentally, I find discrimination against atheists and gays almost always stems from the same source.

Still, 4:47, where the fuck did that come from? What the hell is wrong with you?

In other news: the chicken crossed the road because it appeared to be beneficial to that chicken as far as evolution is concerned; it takes only one person to change a lightbulb, assuming they have a basic level of competence; and, even if they are in an airing cupboard which is highly unlikely, neither of the flies is in the army, since you have to be human to be in the army.

I feel like the Knight and Bishop ought to be the same colour for this to work, making it some sort of "light-side mission to Catan", since it takes one less step than assuming the Chess forces called a truce and are colonizing Catan TOGETHER for some reason.

Accidentally read the unhyphenated "hangup" as "han-gup", had to Google it, thought it was some weird reference. Note to self: do not over-think XKCD.

latest XKCD: 7/10, because I feel like there's enjoyment to be had with a small tweak.

I enjoyed the latest XKCD just because it has that feeling of old-school wackiness that was the hallmark of older strips. Is there stuff to complain about? Of course, and Rob will probably tear it to shreds. My biggest complaint is that there isn't a real punchline. But otherwise, I think the situation is humorous, and the chess references were pretty funny, so I liked it.

The other problem is that, again, Randall's done that thing where he throws in a relatively obscure geek reference that makes his fanbase go 'OMG I KNOW WHAT THAT IS GOOMHR' (swiftly followed by a deep breath, then a bellow of 'OMG I BREATHE OXYGEN TOO GOOMHR', repeated ad infinatum until death) but renders it confusing to anybody who doesn't get the reference.

Sure, but only relatively obscure in the sense that Settlers of Catan is relatively more obscure than Chess, which is like saying Doctor Who is relatively more obscure than Star Trek. You can buy Catan practically everywhere nowadays, and the only way you could have not heard of it is if you've never looked at the board game shelves at the stores.

By which I mean that the comic is even worse than you're saying, because if you don't get to feel smug for knowing the reference then there's nothing to enjoy at all.

There is quite a bit of cleverness in today's comic, but Randall's overreliance in throwing in a dozen million references to a dozen million board games is REAL overkill. I'm biased to believe that Randall did this comic as a mere "throwaway gag" to justify the references -- as if he thought it'd be REALLY AWESOME to "cross-over" Chess and Settlers of Catan and Battleship, and had to think up some filler to make it work.

That said, it's one of the best comics Randall has produced in the last several months. Which isn't saying much, but still...

@MykalT, I tend to agree on "without religion people would still be assholes". I'd remark that if we greatly reduced the half-dozen top reasons for assholery (poverty, greed, prejudice, add 3 of your own) then we'd be assholes on a much smaller scale, hurt fewer people, and hurt them less.

However this is neither here nor there. If there had been no religion people would have been oppressed for different reasons, but in fact there is religion and atheists are some of the oppressed ones (in the western world). If there was no racism people might have been segregated based on hairdo, but there *is* racism and we should fight it.

@Ravenzomg, atheists have it better and worse than black people had it. Atheists weren't brought to a condition of poverty by centuries of slavery, and they are able to hide their atheism. However there are (right now) far fewer atheists than blacks, so it is much harder to get a social movement going. On the other hand, the analogy to homosexuals is quite close. I guess that if you had been an idiot in the 70s you would have flamed the gay rights movement.

@SoupDragon: Some angsty atheist cuddlefish is feeling oppressed in Western Society, so we're humouring his discussion because Rob the Three-Toed Beast has failed to provide us a new thread, and honestly, there's nothing very exciting about the new XKCDs, they're just in that mediocre pool. Which makes us default to whatever the topic of the day is, be it Twilight, Atheist Angst, or whether Anal is an expression of true love [it is].

Re XKCD839:I'd go so far as to say that the basic setting presented in 839 is cute and kind of entertaining. I like the idea of a bishop and a knight screwing with each other over board dynamics, and then bitching in a supremely passive-aggressive manner about it.

So again, I'm concluding that this is one of Randall's good ideas that's a few steps away from being orchestrated well.

@The Internet: Yes, it is I, the Supreme Defender of Christianity, who chose to name myself after the most Christian of birds, the "Ravenz[omg!]"

Re:anon 6:22 - how about the right to put a quote from Constitution about the separation of church and state on a billboard? Not allowed in my country, apparently. Or the right to not have our kids be brainwashed with Christianity at school? Religitards exist outside of America too, you know.

Re:xkcd - MISSON. Ugh. Also, I can't seem to find anything funny in the comic. Is it a reference to something?

I posted a scathing review of todays limp dicked failure of a comic on the xkcd forums. It seems that all posts must be approved. Now i know why the forums seem to filled with ass kissing; i'd like to see a forum made from the deleted posts.

You probably won't see my post as i'm sure it will be marked as "too offensive" or some other pansy bullshit.

I can't wait to see what kind of angry rant this gets from Rob (kind of like waiting for a building to get demolished)

The best thing I've read in this comment thread was "feasting on his loved ones". LOLed on that.

RE:Atheist debate: There's no way to debate this without both sides being deemed assholes and/or intolerants. Someone needs to decide they can live with the other side "winning", and as an atheist that simply don't care about religion, I can live with Christmas and other holidays being nationally recognized by law. I still don't know why religion being taught in schools makes sense to anyone, but I don't want to go on with this discussion.

New comic... is okay. I agree with... someone who said it makes no sense that the bishop and knight are the opposite colors, and I never played Catan. But all in all... it's actually not a complete failure of a comic.

Boring, preachy comic. Stupid review. Science hasn't done "vaguely usesful things for medicine", it has given us any and all modern medicine we have. Medicine that actually works relies 0% on God.

Now, this is a terrible subject for a comic, and Randall predictably delivers shit. But the facts that Randall likes science and Randall is stupid do not together imply that science is stupid. As much as I groaned at the comic, the review sucked more.

textbook behavior! yes, that is definitely behavior. you caught me, behaving in a fashion. admittedly you aren't accurately describing my behavior, but I am definitely behaving, and you deserve credit for noticing that. so, congratulations!

I do applaud you for buying into the traditional atheist fallacy that anyone who thinks you are a fucking moron has to therefore think that your religious equivalents are not also fucking morons, though.

thank you for your speedy reply, baby jesus was defenseless there for only 3 minutes!

way to say something negative about religion only very indirectly! "I sarcastically applaud someone for buying into a fallacy that claims that someone might not think that some religious people are morons!"

it's ok if your family are religious morons, you can come out and say it

What the hell is this?

Welcome. This is a website called XKCD SUCKS which is about the webcomic xkcd and why we think it sucks. My name is Carl and I used to write about it all the time, then I stopped because I went insane, and now other people write about it all the time. I forget their names. The posts still seem to be coming regularly, but many of the structural elements - like all the stuff in this lefthand pane - are a bit outdated. What can I say? Insane, etc.

I started this site because it had been clear to me for a while that xkcd is no longer a great webcomic (though it once was). Alas, many of its fans are too caught up in the faux-nerd culture that xkcd is a part of, and can't bring themselves to admit that the comic, at this point, is terrible. While I still like a new comic on occasion, I feel that more and more of them need the Iron Finger of Mockery knowingly pointed at them. This used to be called "XKCD: Overrated", but then it fell from just being overrated to being just horrible. Thus, xkcd sucks.

Here is a comic about me that Ann made. It is my favorite thing in the world.

Frequently Asked Questions

Divided into two convenient categories, based on whether you think this website

Rob's Rants

When he's not flipping a shit over prescriptivist and descriptivist uses of language, xkcdsucks' very own Rob likes writing long blocks of text about specific subjects. Here are some of his excellent refutations of common responses to this site. Think of them as a sort of in-depth FAQ, for people inclined to disagree with this site.